Zimbabwe allows hunters to shoot elephants for US$70,000 a head to fund national parks
- The hunting season will resume this year after the pandemic scuppered plans to have elephants shot by foreign tourists in 2020
- The elephants will be shot in hunting concessions rather than the parks frequented by photo-safari tourists
Zimbabwe plans to sell the right to shoot as many as 500 elephants for as much as US$70,000 per animal to help fund the upkeep of its national parks.
Zimbabwe has the world’s second-biggest elephant population and neighbouring Botswana has the largest.
Both have been criticised by environmental groups for their plans to profit from elephant hunting. Botswana is resuming hunting after a five-year ban. Zambia and Namibia also have substantial elephant populations.
“How do we fund our operations, how do we pay our men and women who spend 20 days in the bush looking after these animals?” said Tinashe Farawo, a spokesman for the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, in an interview on April 17.
“Those who are opposed to our management mechanism should instead be giving us the funding to manage better these animals.”
